Back By Unpopular Request.

[merv]

WOF is obtained - Registration granted... She's legal..
..

I hope you put a bit more air in that back tyre as well.

Looking good though!

[Paul in NZ]

I hope you put a bit more air in that back tyre as well.

Looking good though!

Yes Merv.... A case of wild jubilation wiping out common sense. I was not happy with the way it was riding at all... The front end on the C bikes is very stiff due to 'sidecar' springs being fitted for heavy duty (off road) use and it gives them an odd 'bouncy' ride that I was seriously thinking of addressing via modern progressively wound springs. The front end got tapered roller steering head bearings, new tubes, bushes, seals and replaced the damping units so I fully expected everything to be a bit tight.

After going through 2 alignment sessions it seemed OK in the shed but dreadful on the road.

Then I saw that picture......

Ahh - well - yess - tubed tyre do loose a bit of air over 6 months or so eh?? Especially since I never ever checked em when the new rubber was put on...

Lets just say 10mins with a pump saved me a day in the shed and the ride is transformed. D'oh!!

Another lesson from the depths of the shed...

[Motu]

http://www.trademe.co.nz/Trade-Me-Mo...n-68491016.htm

This seems to be our default classic Triumph thread....

I just put a WoF on this bike,no charge.It belonged to a cutomer who became a friend,we went on some poker runs.I saw him walking up the road a few weeks ago,I thought he looked pretty crook....and that may of been the day he died.I don't think he had much in life,and his friends are selling his bike to pay for the funeral,it's the only thing of value he owned.At least he spent his last years riding a nice bike.

I remember all the trouble he had rebuilding it,he almost gave up in despair.It's a very rare 750,and no other 750 parts fit it.Although it's a '73,I suspect it may be earlier.When the flattrack rules were changed to allow 750's everyone except Norton were caught on the hop,no OHV 750 motor.So Triumph did a quicky big bore 750 and sold a few for homogulation purposes.It was afterwards that they made the real 750 - so I think this is the homogulation model....and kinda rare.

[Paul in NZ]

Hi Motu

Sorry to hear about your friend - sounds a bad business.

To throw some light on it....

It's definately NOT the very rare T120RT 'Experimental' bikes built by triumph in the USA using specially made Routt 750cc kits. 204 of them were made (plus some spare barrels) and the bikes were made to take advantage of the revised AMA rules that allowed 750cc OHV engines in flat tracking and they were essentially pre OIF 1970 bikes uncrated in the US and kits added. These are quite valuable and easily faked (the barrels were marked differently to the std Routt kit but the 'T' was added in the USA when the conversion was done)

This is probably one of the very first T140's (around 1973) made. In these very early bikes a 75mm bore was used (724cc ) as opposed to the later 76mm bore that featured a thicker walled casting. They are quite rare as they were only made from sept to dec 1972. (the block part # changed later again that model year but not sure why)

Anyway - I think the 724cc models are engine numbers KH17124 through to CH29520...

So rare yes - but sadly not in a really valuable way unless a collector wants one to round out a collection of odd T140's...

Paul N

[limbimtimwim]

Oh, that's quite nice.

A slight pang of 'Maybe you should sell the GSXR for something like that' was overridden by 'You can cope with more debt!'. Which was then all shouted down by 'You are going to the MotoGP next month'.

[Motu]

Ah,thanks for that Paul - I knew about the 200 odd homogulation bikes,and there were some early 750's sold before they revised the engine,but no idea what was what when.It seemed every part he got for the bike was wrong,and it was a long time before he found someone who realised what he had.

Yamaha did the same thing,750 kits on 200 bikes or so.But they didn't sell,and they converted them back to stock....the 750 kits were available over the counter from Yamaha,US only of course.Later when the motor couldn't make anymore HP because of the head casting Kenny Roberts had them make a special cyl head.....and of course they had to make X amount of motors with the head.A marathon effort was put in to put the heads on,but only one was real and a runner - they made sure this was the one inspected and it was stamped ok.

[Paul in NZ]

Ah,thanks for that Paul - I knew about the 200 odd homogulation bikes,and there were some early 750's sold before they revised the engine,but no idea what was what when.It seemed every part he got for the bike was wrong,and it was a long time before he found someone who realised what he had.
.

I was a bit surprised it was still running a 75mm bore... Most of them would have been converted to 76mm by now I would have thought.

It was a prick of a time for Triumph really. The early 5 speeds (T120V) was a good idea (fastest Triumph tested since the TT120T) but they blew it by making the gears too brittle and they had to come up with a kit to fix the problem, then gear up for the 750 that the factory really really didn't want to make, it was the US dealers that forced the issue... They missed the crucial 71 USA sales season due to BSA's P38 frame screw up etc etc... sigh...

I would not be amazed if there were a lot of other undoccumented differences as well. Couple that with sorting out 30 years of unofficial owners mods and.... (sigh)

As you have said before - they are quite nice bikes but it's important to know what you have because while most bits are interchangeable, not everything is and many things should not be used.

Hope they manage to sell it. It would be a great thing to properly restore and put away - much better collector potential than a normal T140 but frankly, it will be a few years before that happens. I mean there are so many oddballs TSX, TSS, Specials, Royal Wedding, Jubilee, Executive etc etc